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The Proton-M rocket booster blasts off at the Russian leased Baikonur cosmodrome, Kazakhstan, Monday, March 14, 2016. The Russian rocket carries an orbiter for measuring atmospheric gases of Mars and a Mars lander of the "ExoMars 2016" mission. "ExoMars 2016" is an astrobiology mission by the European Space Agency (ESA) in collaboration with the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos). (AP Photo/Dmitri Lovetsky)

European, Russian space agencies launch mission to Mars

By Frank Jordans and Christoph Noelting - Associated Press

This publicly provided image by the European Space Agency ESA shows an artist&#8217;s impression of the Rosetta orbiter deploying the Philae lander to comet 67P/Churyumov&#8211;Gerasimenko. The image is not to scale; the Rosetta spacecraft measures 32 m across including the solar arrays, while the comet nucleus is thought to be about 4 km wide. The European Space Agency has set a tentative date for the first landing of a spacecraft on a comet. ESA says Tuesday Dec. 10, 2013 its Rosetta probe will wake up from hibernation Jan. 20 before chasing down comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. If all goes according to plan, Rosetta will launch a lander onto the surface of the comet on Nov. 11, 2014. (AP Photo/ESA, C.Carreau)

Space probe on course to land on mile-wide comet

By Frank Jordans - Associated Press